New York City has been a source of inspiration for countless musicians, from John Lennon to Jay-Z. The energy of the people and culture continues to attract new artists to the area – including Recording Arts graduate Dave Clauss, who moved to Manhattan after graduation to start his career as an audio engineer in this influential music scene.

“From the beginning of school, I had no other thoughts, I just wanted to be an engineer,” he says. “People get into this job because they don’t want a 9-to-5 deal. It’s different, and I love being a part of the music industry up here.”

Dave got his start at Platinum Sound, a popular recording studio in the heart of Times Square where he interned for four months before being hired as an assistant engineer. After building his studio skills working on dozens of sessions, he took on the role of full-time audio engineer, a position that has him responsible for helping artists actually produce the sounds they hear in their heads and capturing it on tape.

“The creative side of engineering is just great, you can take a song from one point and mold it into this whole other thing,” he says. “There’s so much you can do with music, and you never know what you’re going to get. Sometimes you’ll get the perfect sound right away, and be like ‘That’s it, that’s the sound we’re looking for,’ and other times you’ll be fighting it for hours. It’s a balance between being really organized and having the technical skills to make the music sound great, and I think that’s something that really helped me get a jumpstart early on.”

That approach has helped Dave build a successful career working alongside a number of major artists, and after a little more than three years in the industry, he’s had the opportunity to contribute to such high-profile albums as U2’s No Line on the Horizon and Maxwell’s GRAMMY®-winning BLACKsummers’night. The Maxwell album was a particular highlight, with the artist laboring over it for six years, constantly re-recording until he was able to create just the right feel for each song.

“We got this really unique sound that no one’s ever heard before, and it was a complete step left from his older stuff,” Dave says. “This one is really vibe-y, with all live instruments, so it was cool to be involved and witness the whole thing come together. Maxwell’s a great guy, and everyone on that record was really positive. Towards the end we were working for three months straight, and he was really happy, and we knew it was going to be something really special.”

Audio engineering continues to inspire Dave in new ways, and he’s taken that momentum into his latest project, Shakira’s follow up to her multi-platinum 2009 release, She Wolf. Like the Maxwell record, the album is using all live instruments, and the energy of the sessions is a reminder of why he got into music in the first place.

“It’s really positive when you’re working on good music with good people, and this stuff I’m in the middle of now is great,” he says. “The best part of this job is when you’ve put a track together, and the artist comes in the room and you play it for them and you see this big smile on their face, and they’re like ‘That sounds awesome.’ That’s so satisfying, because it’s your creativity pleasing people. That’s happened a lot with Shakira, and I’m really looking forward to it getting out there and people hearing this. These are the kinds of experiences that make this job so worthwhile.”